Perceptual Mechanisms of Anxiety and Its Disorders

Wen, Li

doi:10.1017/9781108140416.004

“…Nonetheless, this ecologically advantageous process is impaired in socially anxious individuals, largely due to diminished response suppression at intermediate fear levels. This impairment in early sensory suppression of ambiguous, boundary cues is consistent with the notion of sensory disinhibition in anxiety (Clancy, Ding, Bernat, Schmidt, & Li, 2017;W. Li, 2019).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 85%

“…Ample research has demonstrated differential P1 response to threat versus non-threat stimuli, with its intracranial sources localized to early visual cortices in the occipital lobe (cf. (W. Li, 2019;Miskovic & Keil, 2012;Vuilleumier & Pourtois, 2007). This P1 differentiation of threat (vs. non-threat) could be especially pronounced in anxious individuals, which is often assumed to reflect arousal or attentional bias to threat (Eimer & Holmes, 2007;Forscher & Li, 2012;Krusemark & Li, 2011;W.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…In conclusion, by modeling fear processing across a neutral-fear continuum, we identified impaired threat categorization in association with trait social anxiety, which arises from disinhibited early sensory response to ambiguous cues. This lack of early sensory inhibition towards dismissible signals could represent a failure to filter (or "gate") out innocuous sensory input from entering downstream processing, triggering excessive threat responses (Clancy et al, 2017;W. Li, 2019).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Cognitive theories of anxiety have implicated aberrations in early and late stages of threat processing (Bar-Haim, Lamy, Pergamin, Bakermans-Kranenburg, & van, 2007;Beck & Clark, 1997;LeDoux, 1995;W. Li, 2019;Mogg & Bradley, 1998;Ohman, 1993).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Impaired early visual categorization of fear in social anxiety

Meynadasy

¹

,

Clancy

²

,

Simon

³

et al. 2019

Preprint

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Social anxiety is associated with biased social perception, especially of ambiguous cues. While aberrations in high‐level processes (e.g., cognitive appraisal and interpretation) have been implicated in such biases, contributions of early, low‐level stimulus processing remain unclear. Categorical perception represents an efficient process to resolve signal ambiguity, and categorical emotion perception can swiftly classify sensory input, “tagging” biologically important stimuli at early stages of processing to facilitate ecological response. However, early threat categorization could be disrupted by exaggerated (or disinhibited) threat processing in anxiety, resulting in biased perception of ambiguous signals. We tested this hypothesis among individuals with low and high trait social anxiety (LSA/HSA; defined relative to the current sample), who performed a two‐alternative forced‐choice (fear or neutral) task on facial expressions parametrically varied along a neutral‐fear continuum. The groups diverged in the reaction time (RT) profile along the neutral‐fear continuum, which was characteristic of categorical perception in the LSA (vs. HSA) group with drastically increased RT from neutral to intermediate (boundary) fear intensities, contrasting monotonic, nonsignificant RT changes in the HSA group. Neurometric analysis along the continuum identified an early neutral‐fear categorization operation (arising in the P1, an early visual ERP at 100 ms), which was nonetheless impaired in the HSA group (due to disinhibited response at the neutral‐fear boundary). Absent group differences in higher‐level cognitive operations (identified by later ERPs), current findings highlight a dispositional cognitive vulnerability in early visual categorization of social threat, which could precipitate further cognitive aberrations and, eventually, the onset of social anxiety disorder.

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“…It is generally understood that threat processing involves multiple processes and stages or “waves” (Adolphs, ; LeDoux, ; Pessoa & Adolphs, ; Vuilleumier & Pourtois, ). Cognitive theories of anxiety have implicated aberrations in early and late stages of threat processing (Bar‐Haim, Lamy, Pergamin, Bakermans‐Kranenburg, & van IJzendoorn, ; Beck & Clark, ; LeDoux, ; Li, ; Mogg & Bradley, ; Ohman, ). Much empirical evidence has been garnered with respect to later threat processing in social anxiety, such as biased appraisal and interpretation (Heinrichs & Hofmann, ; Mathews & MacLeod, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impaired early visual categorization of fear in social anxiety

Meynadasy

¹

,

Clancy

²

,

Ke

³

et al. 2019

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Social anxiety is associated with biased social perception, especially of ambiguous cues. While aberrations in high‐level processes (e.g., cognitive appraisal and interpretation) have been implicated in such biases, contributions of early, low‐level stimulus processing remain unclear. Categorical perception represents an efficient process to resolve signal ambiguity, and categorical emotion perception can swiftly classify sensory input, “tagging” biologically important stimuli at early stages of processing to facilitate ecological response. However, early threat categorization could be disrupted by exaggerated (or disinhibited) threat processing in anxiety, resulting in biased perception of ambiguous signals. We tested this hypothesis among individuals with low and high trait social anxiety (LSA/HSA; defined relative to the current sample), who performed a two‐alternative forced‐choice (fear or neutral) task on facial expressions parametrically varied along a neutral‐fear continuum. The groups diverged in the reaction time (RT) profile along the neutral‐fear continuum, which was characteristic of categorical perception in the LSA (vs. HSA) group with drastically increased RT from neutral to intermediate (boundary) fear intensities, contrasting monotonic, nonsignificant RT changes in the HSA group. Neurometric analysis along the continuum identified an early neutral‐fear categorization operation (arising in the P1, an early visual ERP at 100 ms), which was nonetheless impaired in the HSA group (due to disinhibited response at the neutral‐fear boundary). Absent group differences in higher‐level cognitive operations (identified by later ERPs), current findings highlight a dispositional cognitive vulnerability in early visual categorization of social threat, which could precipitate further cognitive aberrations and, eventually, the onset of social anxiety disorder.

show abstract